[ Ref. Mark Singleton in 191029 MMDigest ]

I read with great interest the lengthy email, forwarded by Mark
Singleton, from David Worrall of the MBSGB in which he noted the
existence of another cylinder music box, with a surviving tune sheet,
that apparently plays exactly the same eight hymn tunes in the same
order as the cylinder music box, without a tune sheet, for which
I recently identified seven of the eight tunes from a recording of
them posted on YouTube. https://youtu.be/zHPRNV1je2w 

I was surprised to find that the fourth tune on the box with the tune
sheet, the tune that I reported I was unable to identify, was listed
in the tune sheet as the once extremely popular and well-known hymn
"Nearer my God to Thee".

I most certainly considered this hymn as a possibility for the
unidentified tune because it has the right meter, but in the recording
it did not sound at all to me like the tune "Bethany" by Lowell Mason,
which, as Mr. Worrall noted in his email, is the tune to which the hymn
is most commonly sung, and I therefore also considered some alternative
tunes with the same meter that have also been used for the hymn, but did
not find that any of them matched the tune on the cylinder box either.

(By way of background as to my familiarity with the hymn, I should
perhaps mention as a matter of possible interest that my connection to
mechanical music is first and foremost the cob roller organ, and the cob
"Nearer my God to Thee" (using the tune "Bethany") is one of the very
most common cobs on both the 20-note and 32-note cob roller organ, to
the extent that it is often said as a sort of joke among cob collectors
that it is rare to find any group of 20-note cobs for sale that does not
include at least one copy of that cob).

It appears from Mr. Worrall's email that he has not yet had access to
the recording on YouTube and I suggest that Mark Singleton make the
recording available to him.  He is obviously very knowledgeable about
hymn tunes and I would be curious to know what he thinks about the
possible identity of the fourth tune on the box after listening to the
YouTube recording of it: Is it indeed intended to be an arrangement of
"Bethany", is it perhaps some other hymn tune that has been used for
"Nearer my God to Thee", or is it conceivably another hymn tune entirely
so that the programs on the box with the tune sheet and the one without
the tune sheet did differ in the fourth tune (which, as Mr. Worrall
noted, seems quite unlikely).

Richard Dutton - The Roller Organ Cobography
New Jersey
https://cobs.rollerorgans.com/ 

 [ YouTube, melodies identified by Richard Dutton --
 [ https://youtu.be/zHPRNV1je2w 
 [ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zHPRNV1je2w&feature=youtu.be 
 [
 [ 0:00:00.0  1. Jesus of Nazareth Passeth By
 [ 0:00:28.6  2. Jesus, Lover of my Soul ("Hollingside")
 [ 0:00:57.2  3. Hold the Fort
 [ 0:01:26.4  4.
 [ 0:01:55.1  5. Sun of my Soul, Thou Saviour Dear ("Te Deum Laudamus")
 [ 0:02:24.9  6. Tell Me the Old, Old Story
 [ 0:02:55.6  7. The Gate Ajar for Me
 [ 0:03:27.8  8. The Sweet By-and-By
 [
 [ -- Robbie